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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23110663">cake and chaos</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/zinabug/pseuds/zinabug'>zinabug</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Lily of-many-names [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Mechanisms (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Birthday Party, Gen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 15:33:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,454</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23110663</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/zinabug/pseuds/zinabug</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>birthday? whats a birthday again??<br/>Lily is NINE and she wants a party</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Lily of-many-names [5]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1962349</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>80</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Lilly-of-Many-Names Tales</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. BIRTHDAY????</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>some amazing art by smolghostings!! <br/>https://smolghostings.tumblr.com/post/612919029865250816/cake-and-chaos-zinabug-the-mechanisms-band</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Jonny! Wake up!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily was bouncing up and down, grabbing onto his coat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He blinked several times, looking up at her. She was wearing one of Ashes’s waistcoats over one of his shirts and he couldn’t even see the shorts she was wearing under it. Her hair had purple streaks in it- </span>
  <em>
    <span>when did that happen?. </span>
  </em>
</p><p>
  <span>“What do you want, Lily?” he sat up and tried to push his hair out of his face, only to find that he was still mostly wearing his goggles. There were going to be red marks on his face when he did take them off. “Why is your hair purple?” He glanced down. His shirt had a lot of blood on it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“It’s my birthday!” she announced proudly. “That’s why my hair is purple! Ashes did it!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s a birthday again?” he hadn’t ever celebrated his as a kid. He didn’t remember when it was.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The day you were born! It means you’re older!” Lily tugged at his coat again. “We need to have a party!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How old are you again?” his head hurt a lot. There was more dried blood in his hair. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m NINE now!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ashes followed Lily into the room, their hands stained purple from hair dye. “I told Lily Lemon here to leave you alone since you died what, three times last night?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jonny stood up, heavily leaning on the wall. “Four, probably. I don’t remember too clearly.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jonny….” Lily wined, wrapping her arms around his leg. “We need to have a party….” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How about you let Jonny here change his clothes so he’s not all bloody at your party?” Ashes looked up at Jonny. “I’d wash your hair too.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What happened toTim?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He has been up since I was coloring Lily’s hair. He drank less than you last night, and you only killed him twice.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Great. Fucking wonderful. I’m going to take a shower and then kill him again.” Jonny stomped out of the room </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Everyone was in the kitchen when Jonny came back, gathered around Lily and the Toy Soldier as they drew an elaborate birthday cake on a blank paper ripped from the end of a book. Ivy looked rather upset about it. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jonny picked up an opened milk carton from the counter and took a swig, only to realize it was whiskey. He drank it anyway, before actually looking at the carton. It was labeled “WHISKEY. NOT FOR LILY.” in raphealla’s handwriting. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Who left this out?” he demanded, holding up the carton. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You did.” Marius said, not taking his eyes off lily</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jonny made eye contact with Tim, who was looking as put together as Tim ever did and only had a little gunpowder on his face, and flipped him off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Not in front of Lily!” Marius said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can curse in front of Lily, she’s used to it.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily looked up from where she was coloring in the three tier cake her and the Toy Soldier were coloring, and cheerfully announced, “Fuck!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“A swear? A </span>
  <em>
    <span>swear?</span>
  </em>
  <span>” Marius practically yelled at both Lily and Jonny. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jonny gave him a look he hoped translated to “I’m going to kill you later” as he took another drink from the whiskey milk carton. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“When’s your birthday?” Lily asked the Toy Soldier. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I don’t have one, for I was never born.” it said. “However, I quite like the idea of having one. What day do you think I should pick?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How about tomorrow?” Lily suggested. “Then we can have a party tomorrow too.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I like that plan,” it said, before carefully drawing a curly mustache like its own on the cake. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Meanwhile, Jonny was glaring daggers at Marius, his hand on his gun. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ashes?  When is your birthday?” Lily was altogether too excited about this, in Ashes’s opinion, although they had enjoyed doing the hair dye. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I was in an orphan house for the first eleven years of my life. I have no idea when I was born.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Pick a day then!” Lily reached up to ashes, who sighed and handed her their hat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“How about the day I got my </span>
  <em>
    <span>revenge</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Ashes pulled a lighter out of their pocket and flipped off the top, showing Lily the small flame that came out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ohh! Revenge on who?” Lily tipped Ashes’s hat back from her eyes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“My shit eating uncle.” they put the lighter back in their pocket. “Burned him and the whole planet too, after they burned me the first time. Smoke inhalation is a bitch, kid, don’t forget that.”  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marius glared at Ashes. “Watch. Your. language.” he hissed. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Jonny, when’s your birthday?” Lily asked, completely oblivious to the invisible firefight above her head. “How old are you?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His face softened as he looked down at her, an abrupt change from the glare he had been wearing a second ago. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well, I don’t remember how old I am. Probably close to a thousand, maybe two thousand, years now.  My birthday, well,” he paused for a second, looking down at her smiling face. “That’d be the day we picked you up now, wouldn’t it.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Really?” She asked, practically glowing.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“yeah.” He reached down and ruffled her hair before turning his attention back to glaring at Marius and Tim. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about you, Ivy?” Lily asked, drawing a smiley face with a curly mustache on the back of the Toy Soldier’s wooden hand. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ivy switched from looking distraught about the destruction of the book where the paper Lily was drawing on had come from to looking confused. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I know this.” She said. “I actually know this.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What is it then?” Lily asked. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She shrugged. “I can’t remember anymore. I think it was in the fall.” She knew that meant nothing to Lily, who had lived her whole life on a starship.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tim was trying to avoid eye contact with Jonny. Normally Tim would just pull a grenade out of his boot and chuck it on the table, but Lily was mortal and she was… bad with explosions and the mechs being dead near her. He was pretty sure Jonny wouldn’t kill him since Lily was there, but he would later as vengeance for that coat. Jonny loved the horrible old thing, insisting on mending it over and over and killing whoever had put the most recent bullet holes in it. Marius was in danger too, as he had tried to tell Lily off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What about you, Tim?” Lily asked. He looked over to her, glad for the excuse not to have to look at Jonny anymore. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The day,” he began dramatically, “that I blew up the moon.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t pick the day you died Tim, that’s depressing,” Raphealla said. She was investigating a jar of faintly glowing pink goo she had left on one of the shelves, that she had carefully labeled “RAPHEALLA’S DON'T TOUCH” to keep Lily from trying to eat it to see what it would taste like.  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Raph, that was the day I </span>
  <em>
    <span>lived</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Tim spread his arms out and looked up at the ceiling as lily giggled. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why do we need birthdays again?” Marius asked, picking at a knife mark in the table to avoid looking at Jonny as Lily’s face fell. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>it</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Jonny pulled out his gun. “You be nice to Lily.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marius froze, looking down the barrel of Jonny’s six shooter </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Damn it.” He whispered, before suddenly leaping into the table, and sprinting into the hallway as Jonny fried twice, striking the wall above his head. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“GET BACK HERE, YOU BASTARD SO I CAN SHOOT YOU PROPER!” Jonny started chasing Marius out the door. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“YOU CAN'T SHOOT ME TODAY!” Marius yelled back. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“AND WHY EXACTLY NOT.” Jonny fired two more shots in Marius’s direction. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“BECAUSE ITS MY BIRTHDAY!” Marius shrieked as another gunshot went off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“FUCK YOU!” Jonny yelled, but he put his gun away and sulked back into the room. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Marius! It’s your birthday too?” Lily asked. “How old are you?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marius walked back into the room with an amount of swagger Jonny found very annoying, fiddling with a rip in his shirt. “Five hundred…. and twenty six.” He said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You just made that up.” Ivy said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I </span>
  <em>
    <span>did.</span>
  </em>
  <span>” Marius took a pen from the Toy Soldiers hand and, on the drawing of the cake under the words “LILY! NINE!” He added in small letters “Marius Von Raum! 526!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What else do you do on birthdays?” Brian asked. He had been very quiet, not wanting to get shot by Jonny, either now or later. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Well,” Lily said. “We decorate and we make cake and eat snacks and give each other presents, like when Ashes did my hair or Tim gave me this!” she pulled a small laser pistol out of her boot, set to stun and decorated with rainbow stripes. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>All of the mechs except the Toy Soldier all looked at each other, thinking the same thing.  </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You get people GIFTS on their birthday?” Marius souded pleased, while Jonny, who had spoken at the same time, sounded horrified. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Brian, very quietly, whispered. “Oh, shit.”</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. PRESENTS???</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>What do you get a child for her birthday?</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“I already got Lemon here her gift.” Ashes took their hat back from Lily and placed it back on their head as they ruffled Lily’s now purple streaked hair with their hand. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Tim glanced at Ivy, who nodded, and the two of them dashed out of the room. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Raphealla reached into her pocket and pulled out a small vial of yellow-orange liquid and handed it to Lily. “don’t drink it. Or breathe it too long. You can draw on the walls with it as long as you stay out of the room until it dries because fumes. It should glow in the dark. Happy birthday.” she returned to inspecting her pink goo jar. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Brian got up. “I’ll be right back.” he walked out of the room, looking slightly panicked. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Maruis smugly grinned at Jonny. “You have to get me a gift now.” he said. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I have one.” Jonny raised an eyebrow and held up his gun. “Half an ounce of lead, to be injected into your brain. You’d better get Lil Lemon a good gift.” he stalked out of the chamber, grabbing the whiskey Milk carton as he went. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The Toy Soldier had quietly been adding pillars to the birthday cake drawing. Lily leaned over to look at it’s work. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“I don’t think we can make a cake with pillars.” she said. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“The pen doesn’t have an eraser.” the TS said, adding flowers clustered around the tops of the pillars. “We need to make what we drew.” </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Well, you should actually start baking then.” Ashes said. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Lily leapt to her feet and started digging around in a cabinet for bowls and cake mix while the TS added a drawing of its hat onto the cake. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Tim held up the small blue bow. “Do you think she’ll like this?” He asked.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Ivy nodded, carefully wrapping up a dozen blunt tipped, rainbow fletched arrows in one of her scarves. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“She’ll grow out of it quick, but then I can actually take the time I need to make her a new one.” Tim checked the gears and string on it, pulling back as if he was going to take a shot and then gently moving the string back to its rest position. “She could help me make it.”  It was very small in his big hands, the ten pound draw weight nothing to him. “It shouldn’t blow up in her face.” he said. “That's what matters.” he sighed and set it on the table. “I hope she likes it.” </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Jonny ripped through his closet, searching for his least battered waistcoat. He had sewn several for himself, but most of them got totally ruined after one good bout of violence. Now, he was looking for one to alter to Lily’s size. He could’ve sworn he made a light blue-grey one with silver buttons that was a little too small for him, but when he eventually found it it had a large hole in the back. He put his whole hand through it ruefully, before tossing it into his scrap bucket.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Eventually he decided on a dark red one. It would go well with the purple hair. He dug his sewing basket out from under a pile of shirts with mendable holes in them, and got to work on the waistcoat. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Maruis not only does not know what exactly ro do with Lily, he has no idea what to give to her. Marius liked kids when he was mortal. Now, they confuse him. He shuffled around in the ship’s medical bay, looking for a suitable gift. Every cabinet contained something more dangerous than the last. Band-aids, gauze, disinfectant onto yet more whiskey onto medicines probably long expired onto a cabinet labeled “Raphealla’s do not open.” He sat on a cot and twirled his hat around and around on his finger as he thought. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Jonny was going to kill him again if he didn’t get Lily a good gift. He was also probably going to kill Tim at least twice for last night. He really hoped that nobody told Jonny that one of the killing shots had come from him, not Tim. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Fuck Jonny and his fucking murder instinct.” he grummbled, putting his head in his hands. Maybe he could just give her one of his spare hats. One of the ones without bullet holes. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Brian, sitting cross legged on top of his desk, carefully drew a smiley face on a spare drumstick (the other one was broken) before carefully wrapping it in a scrap of fabric. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Kids like dolls, right?” He asked thin air before using a small piece of wire twisted around the top of the cloth scrap to keep it in place.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Yeah, kids like dolls.” He answered himself. “Probably.” He held it out to examine his work and nodded. </span>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
  <span>Lily, Ashes and the Toy soldier were having a great time trying to bake. The cake actually didn’t turn out too bad, if a little burned. The frosting didn’t taste bad either. The problem was the ridiculous decorations Lily and the Toy Soldier had been trying to add. Ashes had managed to veto all of the pillars but one, and to build it they had used a pretzel stick that had been in the pocket of Tim’s coat since he shot up a bar to get cash to buy food for Lily. The little girl happily smeared equal amounts of frosting onto the cake as into her mouth as the TS tried to make a piping bag out of what was probably plastic wrap from Raph’s lab. It wasn’t doing too badly either, piping small messy flowers on the pillar. It was thrilled by the idea of anything birthday related, for reasons Ashes couldn’t figure out. The Toy Soldier was confusing at best. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Lily was in charge of writing the words for her name and birthday, in her still untidy nine year old handwriting while the Toy soldier did Marius’s, every letter perfect like it was typing. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The cake looked like a mess. A disaster. But, the mechanisms are a mess and a disaster too.</span>
</p>
<p> </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. PARTY??</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>it is time for the celebration!<br/>Lily gets a weapon.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>thanks to the mechanisms group chat on tumblr!</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Lily was trying to decorate the large room where the mechanisms had their calmer gatherings. She hung up a blanket on the wall with duct tape and put another one on the table to hide scorch marks and knife gashes. She drew a smiley face on the wall with Raphealla’s orange glowing stuff. The Toy Soldier helped her make party hats out of a bad photocopy of Jonny’s criminal record (26 pages long) from just one planet. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>One by one, the rest of the team wandered in. Tim and Ivy first, holding a lumpy package wrapped in Tim’s coat. Brian, who proudly set a small thin paper wrapped package down on one of the chairs in the room. Jonny, holding a thing wrapped in a shirt with several bullet holes in it. Marius, sheepish and apparently empty handed. Jonny, sitting at the table with Lily and telling her a story, glared at him as he came in. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As soon as Marius eneted Lily leapt to her feet on top of her chair, right in the middle of Jonny’s sentence. “We can start now?” she asked. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Of course.” Jonny said, giving Marius another Look. “what do you do first?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Presents!” Lily jumped down and ran over to the chair. She turned around and looked back at Jonny. “Which one is from you?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The one wrapped in a shirt.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She grabbed it and ran back over to him, sitting in his lap as she untangled shirt sleeves from the soft package. As she untangled the last bit of the fabric, she squealed in joy and held up the waistcoat, just her size. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You can SEW?” Brian, Tim and Ivy all said at once.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes, I can. Shut the fuck up Brian.” Jonny was looking slightly embarrassed, an emotion the Mechanisms didn’t think he knew existed. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Brian, who had been just about to open his mouth, shut it again. He just wanted to ask if Jonny could fix his favorite pair of pants. The knee had gotten ripped off. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily immediately took off Ashes’s waiscoat and put on the other one, doing up the buttons wrong. She was grinning. “Thank you thank you!” she said.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“You need some clothes that fit you.” Jonny said gruffly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Which one next?” Lily was bouncing in place and clapping. Brian shyly handed her the gift from him. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Ohhh I wonder what it is!” she said. Brian was about to tell her, but Ivy put her hand over his mouth. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She slowly and carefully unwrapped the drumstick doll. When it was unwrapped, she held it up and carefully traced a finger across its face. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Do you like it?” Brian asked nervously. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nodded, her bottom lip trembling slightly. Lily was remembering the doll she had had before the mechanisms adopted her, scorched and shot and left on the floor of her old room. She hugged the doll against her chest and tucked it inside the waistcoat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The room was silent for a minute before Tim picked up his bundle of coat and scarf and placed it on the table in front of Lily. She smiled, not quite as wide as she had a minute ago, and started unwrapping the blue compound bow. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>As soon as she realized what it was, she let out a gasp and held it up. “A weapon?” She asked, grinning. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“There’s arrows too.” Ivy said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily had never seen or used a bow, but she had read about them in books about warriors of legend. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“SO COOL!” She grabbed it and pulled back the empty string, pointing it at Tim. She was about to let go, but he grabbed her arm and eased it back into the rest position. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t dry fire it.” He said. “That might break the string and it could hit you in the face. You don’t want eyes like mine.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Show me how to use it!” she stood up, heading for the door, but Tim picked her up and set her down on the table. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Later. We have to have cake first, and besides the TS and Marius still have to give you your gifts.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Toy Soldier walked up to Lily and took off its hat. Under it, was another, smaller hat. It took that hat off and placed it on Lily’s head before placing its other hat back on its head. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Jonny’s jaw dropped and he stated at the TS. it saluted to him and walked back over to the wall. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Where did it get that?” Raphealla asked nobody in particular. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No idea, and I don’t even want to know.” Jonny said. “Marius!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marius had been trying to sneak out of the room, hands shoved in his pockets. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Marius, what did you get Lily?” Jonny tapped his fingers against the top of his gun. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Um- let me grab it.” Marius took off and ran back to his quarters, looking around the room wildly. The first thing he spotted was one of his belts, lying across a chair. He grabbed it and ran back into the room, shoving it into Lily’s hands. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What’s this?” she held it up. The bet was old and worn, made of black leather with a silver buckle. There was a small gash on the leather of the belt towards the end, and several scratches in it. She reverently rubbed a hand along it. “Is it yours?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>He nodded, trying to sneak out again before Jonny got really angry. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I love it!” lily said. Jonny stopped slowly pulling his gun out of its holster. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She clumsily buckled it around her waist, and even though she tightened it to the last notch it was far to loose. Frowning, she tugged it out, able to hold the buckle about a foot away from herself. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We can add more holes to it.” Ivy said. “I have an awl.” she pulled one out of her pocket.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily took off the belt, handed it to Ivy and watched as she punched several more notches in the belt. There were going to be (yet more) marks on the table when she was done. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Why was that in your pocket?” Brian asked. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Yes.” Ivy responded, punching a final hole and handing it back to Lily. she put it on, and this time, it fit. Lily high fived Ivy, grinning. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We need to eat cake now!” Lily yelled, slamming both hands on the table. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ashes pulled a knife out of their sleeve and cut the cake with it. They promised they had never used it to injure anybody before, and cut the cake into nine massive slices. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Nine because there’s nine of us, and nine because that’s how old I am!” Lily already had frosting all over her face and hands. None of them had silverware of any kind. Her slice of cake was almost gone. She was bouncing excitedly in place, her less frosting covered hand fiddling with the end of Marius’s old belt, rubbing her thumb over the notch in the end. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“After I’m done can you show me how to shoot?” she asked Tim. Tim was busy, having absently tried to take a bite of the pillar was pretty sure he chipped a tooth. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“He’ll teach you how to shoot.” Ivy told her. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Marius was carefully watching Jonny. He was clearly frustrated that he couldn’t kill marius for giving Lily a bad gift, as she loved the belt. There was a chance Jonny would shoot him anyway though. He was just like That. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Brian interjected, his mouth full of cake. “No offense but this is kind of disgusting.” he said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Ashes smacked him in the face. “No offense but shut the fuck up.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Lily grabbed the bow and arrows and shoved them into Tim’s arms. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Show me how to shoot!” she yelled. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We have a place for that.” Tim said, slightly muffled because he had one of his hands in his mouth, investigating the chipped tooth. “Let me take you to the shootin’ range.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’re shootin’!” Lily yelled running out into the hall flapping her arms. “Look, Tim I can fly like Raph!” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tim, harried and unsure of what lily was doing now, chased after her as she did cartwheels </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Nastya had shown her how to do cartwheels a few days ago, and they had been her favorite way of getting around the ship (besides running) since. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She did several cartwheels, a little running, as Tim told her where to go. They were almost there before Lily tripped over herself while doing one of her cartwheels and scraped her knee on the scuffed metal floor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She burst into tears, as Tim ran forwards to see what was wrong, panicking. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Lily! What’s wrong? Are you okay?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Still sobbing, lily pointed at her knee. Tim looked at it. It didn’t seem like a very bad injury. He pulled his handkerchief out of his pocket and gently patted away the little bits of blood seeping out of the small injury. Lily had almost stopped crying now, she was mostly just sniffing and watching Tim. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is that better now?” He asked her, still slightly shaky from the panic. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nodded and rubbed her eyes before leaping up to her feet again and doing another cartwheel, laughing as Marius’s old belt fell up around her armpits. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tim scratched his head, frowning at her. A minute ago she had been clearly upset and in pain, but now she was just fine. He just decided he didn’t understand children and went to open the door to the shooting range. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Inside there were two or three badly beaten targets, as well as a bench with several empty whiskey bottles lined up on it. There was also a large swath of dried blood across the floor. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We haven't used this room in a while,” Tim said, investigating several bullet holes in the wall. “Eventually I’ll get it cleaned up and we can buy new targets next time we visit a planet.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I want to shoot NOW though!” Lily said. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We can still shoot!” Tim said, slightly more loudly than he meant to. “Here's how you use the bow.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He showed her how to knock the arrow, where to pull the sting back too, helped her find her dominant eye and told her what not to do with the bow so she wouldn’t hurt herself. Then he tried to shoot it to show her. Tim hadn't used a bow since he was a kid, it had been guns since he joined the war against the moon keiser. His shot hit the edge of the target. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Here you go.” he handed the bow to Lily. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>She knocked the arrow, held up the bow, and the arrow fell off the arrow rest. Tim placed it back on for her as she drew back the string. Her arm was shaking slightly as she took much too long trying to aim, one eye closed and the tip of her tongue sticking out. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“LILY!” Jonny burst into the room, a smear of blood across his cheekbone. Lily let out a squeal of surprise and released the bowstring as Jonny ran over to her, checking if she was okay. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m fine!” she said, trying to wiggle out of his arms and grab the bow again.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I heard you crying!” Jonny said. “I would have gotten here sooner but I was… er… busy.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I just scraped my knee!” Lily climbed out of his hug and picked up the bow again. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hey, Jonny, you may want to take a look at this.” Tim was standing by the target. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The arrow had hit dead center. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“That's my girl!” Jonny patted Lily on the back. “Lets try again.” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Grinning, lily knocked another arrow. </span>
</p>
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